Meteor shower to dazzle the night sky early Friday

A meteor shower will speckle dots of light flashes across the clear night sky in most regions of America early Friday giving star gazers a magical celestial show.

The annual Eta Aquarid meteor shower began in April, however the peak time is this week, especially in the early morning hours on Friday.

The meteor shower occurs as Earth passes through the debris trail left by Halley's Comet, the popular comet which made it's closest approach to our planet 25 years ago and continues to move further away.

Backyard astronomers will train their eyes toward the constellation Aquarius region in the eastern horizon during the predawn hours on Friday.

Telescopes and binoculars will be the observation tools for most, but for several the trained naked eye and a lawn chair will be used to watch these micro rocks speed toward the atmosphere at 44 m.p.h.

NASA astronomers at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville estimate between 20 to 30 meteors will dazzle across the night sky per hour between 3:30 a.m. thru 5:00 a.m.

Astronomers state the less light pollution around you the better for watching the most meteors streak overhead.

Skywatching weather across the Peach State calls for clear skies and cool temperatures around 50 degrees from Dahlonega south to Savannah. A mug of hot coffee and a muffin are optional during the meteor show.

Even the Earth's moon will assist in meteor viewing as it's crescent form will set earlier in the evening at 9:00 p.m.

If you do stay up you can connect with NASA's web site as they host a live chat session with three noted interplanetary scientists.

Visit NASA.gov beginning at 11:00 p.m. Thursday and ask NASA your meteor-related question.

Halley's Comet is due to make it's next close approach with Earth during the summer of 2061.

Families explore real science at Tellus Science Museum

Tellus Science Museum features a world of exploration. (Atkeison)

Science and nature come to life as dinosaurs and space exhibits take center stage at the world-class Tellus Science Museum located in northwestern Georgia.

Opened in January 2009, the science museum is affiliated with the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C., and home to four main exhibit areas -- the Science in Motion Gallery, a rocks and minerals gallery, the Fossil Gallery and breathtaking Planetarium.

The Science in Motion exhibit features vintage models from over 100 years of transportation.

A full-scale model of the Wright Brother's Flyer fills one room as it overlooks some of the first automobiles and motorcycles from the turn of the 20th century.

A recreated burned-out shell of the Apollo 1 command module -- used in the Tom Hanks HBO miniseries From the Earth to the Moon -- is featured in the exhibit. The module was used in the film to dramatize the January 1967 Apollo launch pad fire which claimed the lives of three astronauts during a launch pad practice countdown.

Adjacent to the module is a model of the Mercury spacecraft which carried the first Americans into space fifty years ago on May 5; and an actual tire used by the space shuttle Atlantis as she landed in 1996.

Beautiful paintings based on the space shuttle program by historical artist Mort Kunstler line the center's walls providing a decorative look at the personal side of NASA's human space flight.

Across the hall, the museum's 120-seat Planetarium is located near the main entrance and offers a variety of astronomical shows every forty-five minutes.

A digital projector in the domed room gives visitors a unique prospective as they soar upon the ocean of space and past galaxies during a detailed narrative show.

Tellus will celebrate national Astronomy Day on Saturday, May 7 with a full slate of activities for kids and adults alike.

Gaze up at earth's closest star, the Sun, in a safe way through Tellus' telescope, and end the day with star gazing views during two shows at 9 p.m. and 10 p.m.

Tellus recently joined a small NASA network of meteor watching camera's designed to spot and record incoming meteors from below 100 miles high as they near the earth's atmosphere.

The science museum's astronomy program manager David Dundee noted the first meteor was tracked by the new Tellus camera on March 17, just two hours after the camera became operational.

"We're seeing two to four meteor events every night," Dundee explained to this aerospace reporter. "The camera is triggered by a light in the sky, and begins tracking" with the other three regional cameras which back up one another as if to say it is not a plane or other object.

Tellus' new camera on the sky can help NASA determine the "direction, speed and orbital plotting of where the meteor came from in our solar system," Dundee added.

It demonstrates how Tellus has become a working science center in partnership with the space agency's location at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville.

Funding for the camera comes from NASA's astronaut safety program, which helps calculate meteorite impacts on orbiting space craft.

Images are relayed to Marshall in real time via an Internet line and studied by engineers to understand the space rock's nature.

Rocks and minerals are a favorite item of Tellus' employees as they work in what was a former mineral museum beginning in 1983.

Rocks and fossilized items are on display in several exhibits around the museum.

Tellus' Fossil Gallery is a favorite for children as they stare up at 41-foot Tyrannosaurus rex poised in a walking stance, or use specialized brushes to discovery fossils located beneath 'dirt'.

A 13-foot long Eremotherium laurilardi, also known as a giant ground sloth, is also on display cast from the bones discovered in Daytona Beach, Florida.

In fact the skeletal make-up of several land and water creatures are displayed giving visitors an in depth look at the mammals and fish from long ago.

Children can uncover real shark's teeth and stones as they search for the rare fossil treats in one section inside the museum. Nearby visitors can pan for colorful stones embedded in beach sand located in a water trough.

Located northwest of Atlanta just off exit 293 and I-75 in Cartersville, this science museum is open seven days a week from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. The center is closed on July 4th, Thanksgiving Day, Christmas Day and New Years Day.

As summer vacation time approaches, Tellus is a fun-filled, inexpensive option for those looking for a short day trip with the children.

Please visit the Tellus web site for the latest on membership, guest pricing, directions and schedule information.

As you conclude your visit and depart, be sure to take note as your child's head turns back one last time as the world of science educates their minds for learning.

U.S. Space & Rocket Center to host April Tweet-up

The U.S. Space and Rocket Center's Space Camp announced this afternoon that they will host their first Tweet-up for 16 lucky people to coincide with the April 29 launch of space shuttle Endeavour.

The two-day Tweet-up is scheduled for April 28 and 29, and will focus on tours of nearby Marshall Space Flight Center and the Space & Rocket Center's museum and rides.

Registration begins on April 7 and will close on April 12.

Those registering need to be U.S. citizens with a government issued photo ID; and follow @SpaceCampUSA and/or their Aviation Challenge Twitter feed @check_six.

"We will provide lunch and dinner meals onsite," Social Media Manager Charity Stewart stated today. "Part of the Tweetup will include a tour of Redstone Arsenal and Marshall Space Flight Center."

Space Camp's STS-134 Tweetup event will concluded a big screen viewing of the afternoon launch of Endeavour at 2:47 p.m. CDT.

The Davidson Center building, located adjacent to the main museum building, is home to one of the three actual Saturn 5 rockets which was to have flown on Apollo 18, 19 or 20.

Mark your calendar and prepare to register beginning on Thursday morning at http://www.spacecamp.com/tweetup.

Have a blast this spring at U.S. Space & Rocket Center

Sunrise greets space shuttle Pathfinder at Rocket Center. (Atkeison)

Spring break in the Peach State is nine days of excitement spent on the beaches of Georgia's scenic coastline or attending golf's number one tournament in Augusta, the Masters.

The same drive time from Atlanta will also allow for an overnight trip to neighboring Alabama's top attraction, the U.S. Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville.

Nicknamed Rocket City, USA, Huntsville is home to the massive space center which lies about four hours west from the north Georgia region.

Home to the popular U.S. Space Camp, this north Alabama space attraction has a large array of both child and adult friendly activities and rocket-styled rides.

Over the past year, the Davidson Center for Space Exploration museum has under gone a sweeping upgrade in it's look and feel as you walk past the historic memorabilia. New artifacts have been added such as an actual moon rock which was brought back aboard Apollo 12, America's second lunar landing.

The command module Casper which orbited the moon for several days during the Apollo 16 mission in 1972 is on display surrounded by a space suit, and an Apollo guidance computer built in 1968 which had the memory of just 72 kilobytes.

A full size lunar lander spacecraft is also on display along with a moon buggy at it's side.

Running horizontal across the length of Davidson is an actual Saturn 5 moon rocket which would have launched on one of the three canceled Apollo flights in 1973. Step up close and view the entire rocket stage by stage. The rocket's five main engines greet you as you walk into this beautifully laid out 21st century museum.

Outdoors is breath taking in it's own right as you step outside the Davidson Center.

Get vertical and soar 140-feet straight up in two seconds with the towering Space Shot ride; or take a spin in the comfortable G-Force trainer and experience three times your body's weight for several minutes just as the real astronauts feel during launch and landing.

The space center is home to two IMAX theaters, and a grand rock climbing wall spanning nearly 25-feet high with enough width to support eight climbers.

Based on the Martian Olympus Mons, the highest volcano in our solar system, boys and girls will enjoy the rock climbing wall so much they will likely go back two and three times. Adults will find the exercise-driven wall as a great physical and mental challenge as they scale the Mars' themed exhibit.

The wall sits next to an incredible futuristic ride known as the Mars Mission Simulator. Take a realistic ride over the landscape of the Red Planet and then below it's surface as you pitch up and down and yaw left and right on a roller coaster of excitement.

The center's main IMAX theater is unlike most theaters with it's 180-degree field of view. This space reporter agrees with the staff, the seats in the top half give your eyes the sense of being there. The IMAX movie now showing is Hubble, which looks at the history and repair missions of the famous space telescope, including interviews and behind the scenes video from the crew of the space shuttle Atlantis' 2009 flight.

Playing in a second theater in the Davidson Center's upper level is the IMAX prehistoric science movie Sea Rex 3D, in which one woman learns about a rare undersea mammal very similar to the T-Rex.

The space and rocket center is located near the secured gates of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, home to the early days of American rocketry and the creation of the 363-foot tall Saturn 5 moon rocket in the 1960's.

Today, Marshall is home to America's space science control center for the International Space Station. Each day, astronauts orbiting 225 miles above earth talk with controllers at Marshall about select science experiments being worked on in microgravity.

At the space and rocket center, several space station related exhibits can be found, including a mock up of the station's Destiny laboratory.

This year will mark the thirtieth anniversary of the first space shuttle flight, and will also witness the final two flights of a space shuttle. What better way to mark the occasions than an up close visit to the only complete full scale space shuttle mock up.

Known as Pathfinder, this mock up of a real shuttle orbiter rests a top an external fuel tank and twin solid rocket boosters. Visitors are able to walk underneath and around the complete space shuttle stack.

Built at Marshall in 1977, the Pathfinder was constructed as a test model to check how future orbiters would be hoisted up for mating to it's rust colored external tank.

Moving across the center's grounds is a rocket garden featuring several of the converted missiles and rockets which carried America's first astronauts into space and on to the moon.

The majestic space center's skyline includes the only vertical full scale Saturn 5 mock-up.

A Saturn 1B rocket used to ferry crews to the Skylab space station stands towering the smaller rockets, including America's first rocket used to journey Alan Shepard and Gus Grissom into space fifty years ago, the Mercury-Redstone.

The Space & Rocket Center is open seven days a week, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. central time. The center is closed on Christmas Eve and Day and New Years Eve and Day.

Ticket prices very upon age and attractions, such as the museum and the IMAX theater. Click here to view the center's current pricing.

Looking ahead to this summer, make plans for you and your child to attend the hottest overnight camping trip on and off the planet -- Space Camp.

Children ages 9 and above can attend Space Camp for two days or up to a week, and can even bring an adult for some of the camp programs they support.

The camp features tours of the space and rocket center, including the rides and rock wall; unique science experiments with camp councilors, and your own bunk bed and locker in the futuristic habitat module.

One councilor this aerospace reporter spoke with explained how in awe he is as the young children leave Space Camp with a better understanding of not just the rockets but the science they learn in just a short time.

"I find it so inspirational to see the young boys and girls we teach leave here with an excitement not just for space flight, but the science here on earth and out there in space," Roger St. Louis, a retired school teacher, stated as we stood underneath Pathfinder.

Mr. St. Louis discussed how important it is in today's age to get the youngster interested in learning, and "what better way than the fun approach we have here at Space Camp".

Select Scout troops across Georgia can enjoy a special weekend at the camp each year, which acts as a stepping stone to inspire the youth to want to come back for the longer stays.

Mark your calendar today and make a point to spend a few days in Huntsville with your child as the space center continues the celebration Marshall's golden anniversary.

Officially dedicated in July 1960, Marshall Space Flight Center grew following President Kennedy's 1961 challenge to land a man on the moon before 1970.

As the day turned to night and the stars shown brightly over Pathfinder, one can image what it would be like to sail upon the ocean of space as you look up at the orbiter with a star laden night sky.

NASA's MSFC recognizes SpaceLaunch News story

The public affairs office at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville linked my story, 50 Years of Rocketry to their web page on Facebook today, and gave this author a big thumbs-up with the words "great piece".

I am not one to promote myself, but this was a great personal honor and I thank the Marshall team for their support.

Rick Smith, Marshall's media writer, emailed this journalist with his thoughts on the piece, "Thanks for the great writing! Keep it up!".

You can read my story on the Alabama space center here.

Marshall Space Flight Center: 50 years of Rocketry

The author stands below space shuttle Pathfinder recently.

Springtime vacations in the southeastern United States are always a fun and exciting time for families.

Whether it's taking in some sun on the beach; visiting scenic attractions and national parks; or the NASA space centers spread across four states -- there is always something cool to do.

One great destination is the site where the first rocket engine tests were performed and the space shuttle began to take shape -- The Redstone Arsenal and the George C. Marshall Space Flight Center.

Located in beautiful Huntsville, this NASA space center sits in the foothills of the Appalachians, surrounded by the picturesque scenery of the north Alabama region.

Mark your calendar today and make a point to spend a few days in Huntsville as the center begins it's celebration of Marshall's fiftieth anniversary.

Officially dedicated in July 1960, MSFC began to grow following President Kennedy's challenge to land a man on the moon prior to 1970. The region was used by the Army in the early days of rocket construction and testing on the Redstone site.

The space center's first director, Wernher von Braun, is credited as the Father of NASA's first rockets. A German rocket scientist and engineer, von Braun and his team left wartime Europe for America to begin work on America's rocket plans in the mid-1940's.

Marshall is one of NASA's lead centers as it supports experiments, water recovery and data systems aboard the International Space Center; and also "developed and manages NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, which probes the mysteries of space with unprecedented X-ray images that help to reveal the structure and evolution of the universe", according to Marshall.

Apollo 16 module which orbited the Moon. (photos: C Atkeison)

Prior to the launch of the Skylab missions, Marshall developed the orbital workshop and the four Saturn launch vehicles which carried the space station in 1973 and the subsequent three Apollo crews to orbit during '73 and '74.

The center has also managed several parts which make up the space shuttle system: the external fuel tank; the orbiter's main engines and solid rocket boosters since the mid-1970's.

This aerospace reporter visited Marshall recently, and reflected back on the center's Golden Age as I spoke to several of it's employees as they face the shuttle program's conclusion later this year.

As one visits the center's grounds, one can easily find themselves taking several gigabytes of images and video of the region around them.

Located at the visitor's center is a space shuttle mock-up resting a top a full scale external fuel tank and a pair of solid rocket boosters attached on either side of the tank.

The exact scale space shuttle stack features the space shuttle Pathfinder, including a cluster of real main engines. Two of the three engines actually flew on the very first shuttle mission, STS-1, in 1981.

Constructed here at Marshall in 1977, the orbiter simulator (later named Pathfinder, above) was used as a test model to check a specific hoisting system later to be used by the space shuttle Enterprise.

During the summer of 1978, Pathfinder was used as a structural test article in dress rehearsals at the Kennedy Space Center to check clearances in the massive Vehicle Assembly Building, and at the Mate-Demate device at the shuttle runway.


In the 1980's, Pathfinder was given the honor of an orbiter vehicle number: OV-098. Shuttle Challenger was OV-099, Columbia was OV-102 and Discovery is OV-103, for example.

According to a Marshall document, the bright rust-colored external tank - known as MPTA098 - was also built in 1977 to help begin main engine cluster testing in Mississippi later that year.

The twin rocket boosters were built after 1987, however were never used in flight or in ground tests.

As one takes in the majestic Marshall skyline, a towering Saturn 5 scale mock-up stands vertically near the Davidson Center.

The 363-foot Apollo-era stack replica is the only one to stand erect. The Saturn 5 flight hardware at both Kennedy and the Johnson Space Center near Houston are showcased horizontal, and Marshall also has a third Saturn 5 which lays horizontal inside the Davidson Center, too.

To see this Saturn 5 standing up right as it did during the moon program of Apollo makes the sight truly unique.

The indoors Saturn 5 lies in an exploded configuration, exposing the second stage engines and that of the upper stage's single engine. All three NASA centers have an actual flight hardware vehicle which was to have been destined for the Nixon-canceled moon flights of Apollo's 18, 19 or 20.

Von Braun and his team were the chief architects of the Saturn 5.

Adjacent to the mighty Saturn rocket is it's predecessor, the Saturn 1B rocket. The smaller 1B is recognized by its checker board center collar and sits at the entrance to the Rocket Garden behind the visitor center's main building.

Other exhibits you can view feature the latest in military technology; actual space crafts which flew including Apollo 16; a rock climbing wall for children and adults; and Space Camp, which is held nearly all year long. Watch my 2010 movie of the sights at MSFC.

Children ages 9 and above can attend Space Camp for a day to up to a week, and can even bring an adult for some of the camps they support.